Nigeria Labour Congress (NLC) has called off the planned strike action scheduled for Tuesday, opting to await President Bola Tinubu’s decision on the new national minimum wage.
Gatekeepers News reports that the NLC President Joe Ajaero made the announcement at the ongoing International Labour Conference in Geneva, Switzerland.
Ajaero clarified that the Tripartite Committee on minimum wage has submitted two figures – N62,000 (proposed by the government and employers) and N250,000 (proposed by labour) – to the President.
He emphasised that labour has not accepted the N62,000 figure as the new minimum wage.
“The tripartite committee submitted two figures to the President… We are waiting for the decision of the President,” Ajaero explained.
“We cannot declare a strike now because the figures are with the President. We will wait for the President’s decision.”
Ajaero also criticized state governors, particularly those under the Nigerian Governors’ Forum, for rejecting the N62,000 minimum wage proposal.
He questioned their claims of inability to pay and called for an end to their demands for decentralization of the minimum wage.
“How can any governor say he cannot pay?… Governors whose states are not contributing a dime to the national purse and who generate pitiable Internally Generated Revenue (IGR) are collecting the same amount as governors whose states are generating billions of dollars into the FAAC,” he asserted.
Ajaero praised Edo State Governor, Godwin Obaseki, who is currently paying a N70,000 minimum wage, as a positive example.
“This is the type of governor that should be emulated and not the lazy ones,” he concluded.
